7 SU­PERB SUN­SETS

There’s no fil­ter re­quired when you snap the daily fi­nale at these des­ti­na­tions

A jewel in the Greek Is­lands’ crown, vol­canic San­torini is fa­mous world­wide for its post­card­per­fect sun­sets, dra­matic views and gor­geous white­washed build­ings that sit in stark con­trast with the sur­round­ing deep blue ocean.

A speck in the Cy­clades, the is­land is a pho­tog­ra­pher’s dream at any time of day or night, but it’s dur­ing sun­set that the vis­ual ap­peal kicks up a gear.

An ea­gerly awaited daily fi­nale, the raised hills of the is­land make it eas­ier to see the fa­bled sun­set, as well as af­ford­ing amaz­ing views over the sur­round­ing Aegean.

Ev­ery­one has their favourite spot along the clifftop rim, but it’s Oia and its ruined fort that is the most renowned. As­sem­bled crowds of tourists will au­di­bly gasp as the white houses turn pink, the sea indigo and the sky burns red, all the while the crys­tal-clear wa­ter in the caldera re­flect­ing the pal­ette of tones mak­ing for a one-of-a-kind spec­tac­u­lar.

VIS­IT­GREECE.GR

2 HIMALAYAS, IN­DIA

Snow-cov­ered moun­tain peaks, high mead­ows and flut­ter­ing prayer flags – the Himalayas has to be one of the finest places in the world to take in a sun­set.

As the sun low­ers, moun­tain tops are slowly il­lu­mi­nated (in­clud­ing four of the high­est 10 peaks in the en­tire world) cre­at­ing a kalei­do­scope of colours that change by the minute. The thin­ner air of high alti­tude re­gions adds clar­ity and in­ten­si­fies colours with sun­set pinks, or­anges and pur­ples ap­pear­ing brighter and mak­ing the sur­round­ing snow­caps ap­pear even more pro­nounced.

To best cap­ture the dis­play in all its jaw-drop­ping glory, World Ex­pe­di­tions has launched a new tour es­corted by a pro­fes­sional pho­tog­ra­pher for 2019.

Rub­bing shoul­ders with the pil­grims en route to the source of the Ganges, sur­rounded on all sides by breath­tak­ing lofty peaks, trav­ellers will be schooled in the best tech­nique to im­mor­talise the mo­ment – no fil­ter re­quired.

WORLDEXPEDITIONS.COM

3 THE MAL­DIVES

De­serted, white sandy beaches, crys­tal clear la­goons and five-star lux­ury aplenty … it’s not dif­fi­cult to see why the is­lands of the Mal­dives are pop­u­lar for those look­ing for an es­cape from the stresses and strains of daily life. Yep, the world’s over­wa­ter villa cap­i­tal is the stuff that hol­i­day dreams are made of and Aussie vis­i­tors to this slice of par­adise have al­most dou­bled in re­cent years.

It’s partly fu­elled by eas­ier ac­cess and partly by an in­creas­ing amount of snaps clut­ter­ing up In­sta­gram feeds – a large chunk of which re­volve around an­other of the ar­chi­pel­ago’s sig­na­ture at­trac­tions: sun­sets.

The per­fect way to end a ro­man­tic, salt-soaked day: wit­ness­ing the sky mir­rored in the In­dian Ocean. The dip­ping sun causes a nat­u­ral the­atri­cal dis­play of in­ter­min­gling colour with mes­meris­ing tones of red, yel­low, or­ange, pur­ple and blue. To top it all off, once the sun fully re­treats, there’s epic stargaz­ing to be had.

VISITMALDIVES.COM

4 ULURU, NT, AUS­TRALIA

Yes, you’ve seen it in count­less pho­tos, so­cial me­dia posts and TV ads, but watch­ing the sun set at Uluru is some­thing that re­ally needs to be ex­pe­ri­enced first-hand. In par­tic­u­lar, the sa­cred rock’s un­canny chameleon-like abil­ity to change colour. The vast mono­lith in­ten­si­fies and shifts – from or­ange and deep

red, to blue and pur­ple – all the while cut­ting a strik­ing sil­hou­ette against the sky.

Draw­ing hun­dreds of thou­sands of vis­i­tors an­nu­ally, the UNESCO World Her­itage site sees campers, daytrip­pers, and ev­ery­one in between, as­sem­ble at dusk among the out­back scrub­lands to wit­ness its dra­matic trans­for­ma­tion and see off an­other Red Cen­tre day in style.

NORTHERNTERRITORY.COM

5 TANAH LOT, BALI

The Aus­tralian love af­fair with Bali shows no signs of abat­ing. Vis­i­tor num­bers are up and the hol­i­day isle is still tick­ing all our boxes with its great surf breaks, lush land­scapes, vi­brant lo­cal cul­ture and stun­ning five-star ho­tels. But the Is­land of the Gods has an­other claim to fame: its sun­sets. And when it comes to Bali’s ul­ti­mate sun­set view­ing spot, Tanah Lot can’t be beat. Perched on a rocky out­crop in the sea, the tiered pagoda shrine is ac­ces­si­ble by foot at low tide, but ap­pears to be float­ing when the tide is high.

The scene of umpteen In­sta­gram posts, this spir­i­tual spot is crowded at the best of times, but in the hours be­fore sun­set, hordes of tourists de­scend to get a prime po­si­tion. How­ever, trav­ellers-in-the-know scale the sur­round­ing hills and se­cure a ta­ble at one of the clifftop bars and restau­rants – all of which of­fer a bet­ter view of the tem­ple – be­fore the masses de­scend, or take the has­sle out of the ex­pe­ri­ence by book­ing on a tour. Ex­pe­dia of­fers mul­ti­ple tour op­tions that in­clude guided en­try into Tanah Lot, along­side a sun­set view­ing ex­pe­ri­ence.

EX­PE­DIA.COM.AU

6 CAIRO, EGYPT

A bucket list des­ti­na­tion in it­self, when it comes to sun­set-hunt­ing, Egypt has more than its fair share of epic view­ing spots, from the abun­dance of an­cient tem­ples and the Sa­hara Desert, to the white sails of fish­ing boats re­flect­ing against the blue wa­ters of the Nile. Here, ev­ery pho­tog­ra­pher will find some­thing in­cred­i­ble to cap­ture. But the money shot for most in the land of the Pharaohs will be the Pyra­mids of Giza. Even the most cam­era-shy of vis­i­tors will get snap-happy when wit­ness­ing the sun lower be­hind the iconic struc­tures. You can time your sun­set watch­ing with a unique sun­rise at the Abu Sim­bel tem­ple, which was con­structed to be pre­cisely po­si­tioned for the sun’s rays to align twice yearly (Fe­bru­ary and Oc­to­ber). On The Go Tours op­er­ates ex­pe­di­tions to wit­ness the unique phe­nom­ena, along­side sail­ing on the Nile and vis­it­ing the pyra­mids in Cairo.

ONTHEGOTOURS.COM

7 CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA

Pic­ture the scene: a sky streaked with candy floss-pink clouds, the sun slip­ping be­neath the hori­zon as it bathes the city and the sur­round­ing moun­tains in a soft, golden light. It’s a well-known fact that Cape Town gives good sun­sets with ev­ery evening sky putting on a show that rarely needs an edit. But in a city filled with epic sun­set-watch­ing spots, where do you go? There’s count­less al­fresco bars and eater­ies of­fer­ing sun­downer deals with a view, but for some­thing spe­cial, ad­ven­ture-hun­gry trav­ellers should hike up Lion’s Head for dusk.

Beloved by lo­cals and vis­i­tors, the peak between Ta­ble Moun­tain and Square Hill boasts 360-de­gree views across the penin­sula, tak­ing in the At­lantic Ocean and the en­tire Mother City. Come pre­pared with some snacks and a bot­tle of bub­bles to toast the end of an­other breath­tak­ing day.